My Favourite Moments

There are so many amazing moments in life. I don’t mean days or weeks. I mean moments. A few minutes or hours at most. Those moments we’ll never forget. That we look back on with so much fondness.

I thought I’d list 10 of the favourite moments of my life so far. I’ve probably missed some out and may need to do a follow up at some point!! They are in chronological order, but the first is from when I was 18. I’m sure I had many more before then, but maybe my memory of them is too blurry!

1. A Level Results

I did really well in my A Levels. I got in to my first choice University (Durham). The sun was shining all day. The magic moment for me was in my friend’s garden, drinking in our happiness at, not only getting our results, but school being officially a thing of the past. The whole day was brilliant, right through to the early hours in our local cheesy nightclub! But that moment in the sunshine enjoying drinks with my best mates, that moment was the best!

2. MSc Dissertation Hand In Night Out

I didn’t enjoy Durham University anywhere near as much as I enjoyed doing my Masters in Manchester. I never really fit in in Durham. But Manchester has been my new home since I came here to do my Masters (and still here now). The handing in of the dissertation rounded off an amazing year. I made some great friends, that I really should make an effort to see more of, and met my future husband in Manchester! We all went out that night, including Sean, and it was SUCH a good night!!

3. Laughing on the beach in Gran Canaria

Me and Sean went on our first holiday together about a year after meeting. Sean had just finished working away in Wales, and we were returning to him being in Manchester. It was the most time we had spent together in one go and it showed just how amazing our relationship was (and still is!)! I can’t quite remember what we were laughing about on the beach that day (I think it involved a German woman?), but I do remember feeling deliriously happy that I was pretty sure I’d met my perfect match!

4. Camping lakeside in Canada

Me and Sean went to Canada in the summer of 2008, and stayed there for 8 months. We had such an amazing time. One of the stand out moments was when we arrived at a campsite in a small village called Burton. We were given a pitch that was lakeside. The view was spectacular! And it was our first time swimming in a lake in Canada. The water was crystal clear. It was truly an out of this world moment camping in such a beautiful spot!

5. Skinny dipping in Canada

At another campsite (we did a lot of camping), there were no pitches left. So the camp manager said the only option would be to camp on the beach below the campsite, next to a lagoon! Wow, did we luck out!!! We were the only ones camping on the beach and we built a HUGE fire! A couple on the campsite saw our fire and came down with a bottle of Jaegermeister. After a few shots, we all decided to skinny dip in the lagoon! My body confidence has always been low. I wouldn’t dare show my body to strangers usually! Daft considering I looked way better than I do now! So it was one of those liberating moments I’ll never forget, even if it was somewhat blurred by Jaeger!!

6. Getting engaged

We were still in Canada when we got engaged, and returned home a few weeks later. There is no big romantic story, but it was a typical Sam and Sean proposal. We’d been out all afternoon drinking. We got home to our poky studio basement flat in Calgary. I put Grease on to watch. Sean didn’t want to watch it and flicked me on the head. I yelled at him for doing it. And he got down on one knee!!! We were drunk enough to decide to wake our family at home, despite it being about 3am in the UK. We needed to go to the shop and get an international call card, and the snow was really heavy, so we made snow angels!!!

7. Our First Dance

We were relatively young when we got married. I was 24 and Sean was 27. Our wedding wasn’t the most expensive, but it was a brilliant party!!! We got married in the Isle of Man and had our reception in a marquee on my mum and stepdad’s field. Our first dance was to Snow Patrol’s Chasing Cars, which was a song that had meant a lot to both of us. We danced like only we know how, and some thought we’d choreographed it. We definitely hadn’t. Not even practiced it once. It was spontaneous funky dancing, and we laid down on the floor at the point of it saying ‘If I lay here, would you lie with me and just forget the world’. We have those words printed on our bedroom wall now.

8. Speaking at my own event

Me and Sean started our first business straight after we got married. We then invested in a franchise, which saw me become a Business Growth Advisor to small businesses in Manchester through a national business growth company. To kick it off, we hosted our own event. Around 70 business people showed up, and it was my first proper speaking gig. Since then my business has mainly become social media training, and I now speak on the stage in front of hundreds. That event was a milestone moment.

9. The birth of Ella

Ella was much longed for. We’d suffered a miscarriage, then it took 14 months to get pregnant again. When Ella was born, I remember feeling euphoric!! I had got through the labour with relative ease, despite her being back-to-back. She was taken straight over to the resuscitation cot and then up to special care, as she’d inhaled meconium. I didn’t realise how bad she was and just remember feeling so so happy at that moment!

10. The birth of Sienna

Sienna was also back-to-back, but again I managed the labour with little difficulty, despite the extreme pain!! In contrast to Ella, Sienna was placed straight on to me. She was a healthy newborn. We shared some skin-to-skin time. While Ella’s birth was amazing cos it made me a mum, Sienna’s was amazing for there being no issues and getting that amazing skin-to-skin time with my new baby.

These are the moments I look back on with so much fondness. I know the girls are going to give me many many more magic moments. Indeed they already have. I feel I’m living a blessed life, and looking back like this makes that the truth!

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5 thoughts on “My Favourite Moments”

Wow such amazing moments and it sounds like you’ve had such a fun life so far! Travelling around Canada sounds absolutely amazing and I would love to do something like that! We had a lot of travelling plans but then Zach was a bit of a surprise and put a stop to that! xx
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Canada was amazing!! We thought we might end up living there but the recession hit and we couldn’t get jobs, and missed home, so we came back! I definitely think we’ll do loads more travelling when the kids are older and we’re retired! It’s never too late!!! Xx